The Pitfall of the fall fair…

On Friday I had a PD Day which meant I got to go to an all-day gymnastics camp! And on Saturday we went to the Ilderton Fair!

He said

Finally this week I got to see Emelia and her much beloved gymnastics! And actually it came on Friday a day early because of a School PD Day and the kismet of an all day gymnastics day camp at Gym World where she takes her Saturday class. Danielle discovered it earlier this week and for me it was a no brainer for a seven year old completely gobsmacked into gymnastics and who is ‘bored’ by all the babies at her house.

Luckily for me I was working a 1–10pm shift on Friday and was able to drop her off in the morning. After my usual round of Friday morning before work hockey I made a beeline home to pick up Emelia and get her to the camp. About half way there she processed that we were headed to ‘the same place she takes her gymnastics on Saturdays‘ with and she proceeded to talk my ear about it. Immediately squashed were any worries that she would have a hard time being left their on her own with the rest of the camp attendees and instructors. She was a little shy when we first arrived, but that all faded way the moment she was delivered to free play on the mats and trampolines. She ran off and within minutes gave me a quick farewell wave and was back to the trampoline with the other kids.

By her recollection when I called home on my dinner break every last bit of the camp was her favourite. She couldn’t discern what was best about the camp—it was all parts equally the best. Suffice it to say I think we have a solution for any of the school PD Days for the rest of the year.

Then Saturday with me off, I was up with Emelia in the morning to let Danielle get some extra shut eye. We spent the morning over our twin bowls of Cheerios and she caught up on some Phineas and Ferb while I nosed around my iPad. The morning was the perfect pace. While I would love if she’d let us sleep in on a Saturday morning, I do really love these mornings up with her when it’s just her and I. I know soon enough she won’t need me to come downstairs and just be near her while she does her morning things, so I relish every morning I still get the request.

After Danielle got up it was off to swim class at the Y. Emelia has really come into her own in the water—especially great at any of the back strokes. Her long legs thanks to Mummy give her crazy kinds of kick propulsion. And she loves being in the water almost as much as I.

From swimming it was home for a quick lunch and then back off in the car off to the thing she looks forward to all week: gymnastics! It was great to see her in her element. And, quite frankly I was a little surprised at how quickly she has taken to it. She did not look like someone who was in her second class. I am really excited to see where she is by the end of the year with this class if this is how she is doing this soon from starting. All parental bias aside, she is a bit of a natural at this.

Once gymnastics was done we settled in on something we’d yet to try out despite hearing so many great things about it for years from friends: The Ilderton Fair. We got there in the middle of the afternoon and were immediately impressed with the size and quality of the fair. The cost is a fraction of what it might to go to the Western Fair but overall about 110% less over crowded and easier to navigate. There were farm animals, rides, midway games, and tons of food to be had. The weather couldn’t have been any better and we had an almost completely amazing time.

That was until the meltdown just ahead of us leaving…

As we started to prepare Emelia for our eventual departure, we made the mistake of doing so right in front of the glitter quasi henna tattoo booth. This after she had decided much earlier in the day that she wanted to spend her allowance on fair rides and midway games. Telling her we were leaving in front of the booth she had decided against after she had spent her money was the fulcrum of an emotion storm that involved me having to hogtie her with my arms and lift her over my shoulders like I was one of the farmers contending with a rogue calf and march out of the fair back to the car with her hurling, kicking and shouting whatever words she could muster in protest.

By the time we finally had her corralled in the car, and were headed home we were cancelling plans for dinner with Poppa and Grandma and headed straight home where she was going to spend her night in her bedroom. By the time we got home after dragging her through some boring for her errands she had realized the levity of her behaviour and had begun her damage control with apologies and acknowledgement of her behaviour. She spent the evening before dinner in her room and wasn’t out till dinner was served. After she had eaten Danielle and I had a very good conversation with her about her behaviour and she actively listened and seemed genuinely remorseful about it all.

The challenge is that we knows that she means absolutely zero of what she is saying or is proud of how she is acting, but still there is some hurt in the way she acts. Both Danielle and I really trying to work with her on how she can better process and share her frustration in a much more conducive way for all of us, and I feel like we’ve made some good progress. But there still is a good chunk of progress we need to make.

By the time bed time rolled around there was a very sweet apology letter from Emelia to Danielle and I, as well she was very affectionate and self conscious about our feelings. It certainly was a much better end to what was a day gone south in a big way. Danielle wound out or day with a couple or two grown-up beverages licking our wounds on the couch while watching some TV.

Today I was off at work, but by all counts Emelia had a much better day with Danielle. But I will let her tell you about that. First I gotta go get my snuggles with Emelia before she heads off to sleep and Danielle and I reconvene on the couch!

She said

This weeks theme was still the bloody mortgage. It is a never ending saga I swear. And I would love to say that we are done with it and we are moving on with our lives but sadly nope. In spite of the insane efforts of my daycare mom and friend Norma who is the assistant to our new lawyer we were supposed to settle and finalize the mortgage for Friday. But even with all of her and the lawyer’s attempts we are still not settled. The funds have been transferred to a trust in the law firm, the paperwork has been signed but there is a power trip of sorts with one company that we bought our AC unit through. We have the payments back to them for a loan and they hold all the power right now. They are dragging their feet, they are delaying and detailing to death a simple refinance mortgage. So we are still not closed, hopefully tomorrow Reliance pulls their strangle hold on the whole process and we can finish up everything and move on with our financial lives.

With all that was going on, the daycare was busy with teething baby and toddlers. Now thankfully we have finally gotten the summer weather that we missed in the summer and we are enjoying a rather warm fall over the last week or so. The weather is more like August than almost October. And honestly I will take as much of this sunshine and natural vitamin D before the gloom of the winter months kick in. The kids have been outside as long as we can, basically we are only in the house for eating snacks and lunches and for the children to nap, otherwise I have them in the yard, for walks or at the local parks. It really has made a stressful week that much more manageable. So hopefully I can FINALLY say in next weeks blog post that we are finalized on the mortgage and we are just focusing on living our lives.

After all the drama of this week I was happy that we at least had Emelia at a place for the PD day. This is the first year when there is such a massive age gap between Emelia and the daycare kids. She is a full 5 years older than my oldest in care and needless to say she wants little to nothing to do with the daycare. I don’t blame her to be honest. She doesn’t have anything she can play with the babies, she is limited as to what she can do on her day off from school that we finally decided to choke the financial bullet and send her to camp. I sort of hate the idea that I am not spending the day with her now that she is in school full time but honestly especially with John’s work schedule Emelia and I get lots and lots of mommy and daughter time. So I made sure she knew she had a choice, that I was not sending her off but rather trying to find something that would be much more fun for her. She needed no convincing and we were set. It was a splurge for us financially as that day camp is pricier than most other camps but she had a blast.

And for me it was a peaceful (well as peaceful as it could be with a screaming teething 11 month old to comfort), the daycare kids all had great and long naps. And I was able to get a ton caught up around the house that had been neglected. It was nice not having to wake the children from their nap to go to the school, we could take the afternoon at a pace that matched their needs. And it also allowed me to spend much of that quiet time dealing with the newest issues surrounding our mortgage.

Once Emelia was home she was exhausted even agreeing that she was exhausted and needed to go to bed early, gasp that never happens! We had a quiet end of the day, relaxing watching a movie and snuggling on the couch.

The next day John got up with Emelia so I could get a much needed sleep in. I decided a few weeks ago that my mornings were far too rushed so I was going to set my alarm for an hour earlier. It has helped getting things done I need to get done in the morning but there are days and weeks like this week that a week of 6:00 wake ups catches up with you. I got some extra rest and then we got on with our Saturday. Saturdays are quite busy for us, mainly around Emelia’s activities. It is more than worth it as I get to see my little girl gain confidence while staying active and healthy. A combination that makes her daddy and I so proud.

I am so glad that John finally got a chance to see Emelia in her element at the gym. She is just in her absolute happy place once she steps foot in the gym. She is really a natural and was far above and beyond what I was at her age when I took gymnastics. She is a natural athlete and fearless in so many way. She is making us so proud.

Once we were done class we made our way home for another snack, got changed and packed a cooler of food and drinks and were off to the Ildeton Fair. After hearing terrible reviews of the Western Fair we had opted to once again skip the overpriced event and opt for a quieter, smaller scale country fair for our fall fair. After hearing wonderful things from many friends we decided to check out fair ourselves. It is smaller, less crowded and a fraction of the cost of the Western Fair. Needless to say we know we will be going back next year.

Emelia loved trying a lot of the rides, petting the animals and taking her chances at the medway games. And aside from the insane meltdown that had us carrying her kicking and screaming over John’s shoulders to leave the fair the rest of the day was amazing. Needless to say she was not allowed to get away with the intense temper tantrum and has been stripped of all her built up allowance to pay us back for the fair. But she took the consequences in stride and has not once asked for her privileges, extra items we were to buy for her this weekend back. She was one remorseful little girl. And although this was an intense and rather embarrassing public temper tantrum her fits are less frequent than in the past and we are continuing to work towards a more acceptable way of dealing with not getting her way.

Originally we hadn’t planned much activities today, Emelia had homework to finish and we had a few errands to get done. Early in the morning I got a text from Komal asking if I wanted to join her and the girls to go apple picking for the afternoon. I asked John what he thought considering Emelia’s behaviour the day before. She had been very remorseful and accepted all the consequences so we decided rather than sit around bored for the afternoon on a beautiful fall day I would take her apple picking. It was honestly as much for me as it was for her. I didn’t want to sit around the house on this beautiful day. So once we got errands done, homework done and some house cleaning we were off to meet up with Komal and the girls.

It was a glorious and hot afternoon. The girls had an absolute blast, they were up and down the sand mountain more times than I could count, they were all over the corn maze, through the apple orchard taste testing apples as we picked. Now the section of sweeter apples was quite limited so we bought some that would be good for baking so I guess I better learn to bake. Emelia is pretty excited to help me try and taste test I am sure. After 5 hours of running all over the country side we took three tired, hot and sand covered little girls home. Although they didn’t want to stop playing we had to say our good-byes.

As I arrived at the mall to pick up John we were invited out for dinner with Helen and Doug so we could properly catch up. It had been a few weeks since we all got together as John had a long stretch of weekend shifts. We had a nice dinner with them and then brought a very tired little girl home for a much needed bath and sleep.